


Sanctuary

by Tridraconeus



Series: Preservation [2]
Category: Predator Original Series (1987-1990)
Genre: Ableism, Ableist Language, Blood, Cooking, Disabled Character, Fighting, Gen, Trans Male Character, Violence, alternating povs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-21
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:07:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22834531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tridraconeus/pseuds/Tridraconeus
Summary: The Hunter returns to exterminate a Bad Blood, and finds an unlikely ally.
Series: Preservation [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1641511
Comments: 13
Kudos: 49





	1. Sanctuary: Noah

**Author's Note:**

> haha bet yall thought Noah died in Reserve. technically he did but this idea GRABBED me and would not let go! Chapter 2 will be posted next Friday.

**July 15th, 1990**

**Ohio**

Someone must have called the cops when they saw him being tied up and driven down to the valley, because just as soon as he was about to finally die searchlights and shouting flooded the spaces between the trees. The thing stopped, drew its hand back, and put him down. Laying on his back like that he thought he’d choke on his own blood, but it just pooled in his mouth and he swallowed it well enough as his throat spasmed in agony. It retrieved his pocketknife and then a tool that looked similar, except the blade started glowing white-hot when it extended; then, it carved something into the hilt of his knife and tossed it onto his chest.

Noah grabbed it. He wasn’t sure what else he could do. His hand spasmed painfully with the effort, and he tucked the pocketknife into his pants pocket. 

Then, the thing disappeared. A helicopter touched down in the clear area by the creek and less than a minute later he was surrounded, drowning in light so bright he had to close his eyes, and then let everything go dark.

He spent a few days in a medically-induced coma as they fixed all the stuff that the hunter had fucked up, and even then things were spotty for a while and he’d carry around what that thing had done to him for the rest of his life.

Of course, they just thought it was because a bunch of his old mates got pissed that his bits didn’t match.

Whatever. He didn’t say shit on account of being unconscious and then had bigger things to worry about once he woke up.

They stitched up his lip and put screws in his scapula. He couldn’t afford the surgery to make his leg not crippled shit, only to make it less crippled shit, so he took that once he was awake enough to make his own decisions. He came out of it having to walk with a crutch and a stiff shoulder on cold mornings.

Then he went back to college and finished his degree, then came back and got a job surveying wildlife activity in very same valley he grew up in, and bowhunted when he found the time.

And for a while, things were good.

**July 21st, 2001**

**Ohio**

“Get the fuck outta my hide.” He squatted down awkwardly to avoid putting too much weight on his useless ankle and knee, not even bothering to look behind him. “I don’t care what secret military tech you stole that’s got the feds after you, you shouldn’t have to be roughing it down here. C’mon up to my house when I’m done here, I’ll get you some hot food and you can sleep on the couch.”

He fixed some awry things in the hide, got the pictures from the Cuddleback, then edged back out into the open.

“Last chance.”

There was no movement, so he sighed, stood, and grabbed his crutch from where he’d leaned it against the external side of the hide.

He liked the days when he went down into the valley and got the pictures off the trailcams. It took all day, and he was sore as hell the next, but even if he had to hobble around with a crutch it felt good to get out there. 

If he was quick about it, he’d get back up to the house before dusk. 

The walk back was always harder than the walk down. He didn’t stop and pause for breath like he used to, but with the heat and the effort he was drenched in sweat by the time he got up to the house. 

He shut the door, hung his bow and quiver up on their hooks by the door, and hobbled to the kitchen where the computer was.

The door opened and shut a second time. He smiled to himself and leaned the crutch against the kitchen counter, turning around to greet the person who’d followed him up from the hide. 

“Yeah, probably for the best— _fuck_.”

God. The thing was huge. He recognized it, too, its armor and mottles and stripes, and halfway wondered why it hadn’t just attacked him earlier.

“Fucker.” Out on a breath. The thing made an amused clacking noise, shaking its head. “The fuck do you want?”

It pointed at his computer, then at the thumbdrive with the pictures. Not hard to figure out. Noah sighed. At least that was better than wanting his head, or wanting to finish the job. It could have the damn pictures. 

“Yeah, sure.”

He palmed the thumbdrive again and followed the counter across the room to where his computer was, brushing pieces of paper off of the keyboard and booting it up. It wasn’t fast, but it did the job well enough. The hunter’s gaze prickled on the back of his neck. 

No blade. No bullet, or whatever superheated plasma was used as ammunition. It needed his help. 

He ducked his head to hide a smile and used the movement to plug in the thumbdrive. It took another few seconds for the file to open, the pictures loading in one-by-one. He stepped out of the way rather than be pushed as the hunter leaned forward, hands on either side of the computer.

“Use the mouse to go down,” Noah said, and scrolled the mouse wheel up and down a few times to demonstrate. The hunter grumbled at him but it didn’t seem aggressive, so Noah figured that every noise the thing made sounded dangerous. “There’s, uh, time stamps in the lower right corner if you wanna know what time the picture was taken. Helps to figure out activity patterns and all.”

The pictures were normal at first; a fox, a family of deer that Noah had been tracking for the past few weeks, a bear trundling right up to the camera, a few raccoons getting into a fight over a dead rabbit— usual valley things. Then, something extremely large and blurry triggered a photo. About a week ago, around midday, on the cam by the creek.

The hunter seemed to be interested in that one, too. 

Noah leaned in to look. 

“Jesus. That—?” Couldn’t be the hunter. It was different. Less green, more gray. _Larger_. The dreadlock-looking things on its head were choppy, some of them short and fat instead of the tapering appendages of the hunter that Noah knew. The hunter made a snarling noise, then a guttural growl, which obviously meant something that Noah couldn’t understand but could certainly decipher thanks to context clues. 

“Okay, well, keep going.”

The hunter obligingly scrolled down. A pattern emerged— the larger thing would wade from the creek and be visible for a few moments, always around midday, and then it would disappear. Had that thing been down there when he was changing out the cameras last time? 

Why was the _first_ one here? For the new monster? It was making a low, growling noise, head at a sharp tilt to the screen. Noah leaned back, then would have jumped if not for his leg when it reached for its sword and slammed it into the wood of the countertop with a violent _crack_.

“Not— not in the fucking _house_ — outside, _now_.” He ducked under the sword, now embedded in his countertop, and pulled the hunter by its armored loincloth-thing. “If you wanna stab shit, you’re gonna stab shit outside.”

It growled at him, but yanked the sword out of his countertop, retracted the blade, and put it back into the sheath, brief moment of violence over almost as soon as it had started. 

“That’s what I thought,” Noah grumbled. He leaned against the counter again. His crutch was across the room where he’d left it. He could probably manage walking over there to get it like a normal person, but he’d pay for it tomorrow by not being able to walk at all. He’d already pushed things by kneeling down so much in the hides. He propped himself up with his elbows to take some weight off of his leg.

“Can you—?” He gestured at the crutch. The thing wasn’t stupid. It understood context clues too, and it seemed to be listening to him at least in some capacity. It reached over and got him the crutch. He muttered a thanks and tucked it under his arm. He’d been told that he could use a cane if he wanted to, but he already hobbled around like an old man enough; no need to look like one. 

“Why are you here again?” 

It pointed to the screen where the new thing was, growled again, then flexed its hand in a strange way. The wristblades popped out in response. Universal enough. Noah shrugged. None of his business. The less of these things around the better, and maybe they’d kill each other— and it felt good to be right. 

“Okay. Well, it’s out and about down there around noon. You can go and check right now or stick around for dinner. Put those things away.” He waved at the thing’s wristblades. 

<< _Dinner_.>> He liked to cook for guests. He liked to cook for himself. He’d already offered to cook the thing dinner even though he hadn’t known it was _the_ _thing_ when he’d done so, but he’d still offered, and there were rules about hospitality that Noah knew better than to break.

“Yeah, dinner. Rabbit and potatoes and what else the hell is in my fridge. Then you can— I don’t know, fuck it, sleep on the couch or in the backyard or something or just go down into the valley again.“

It followed him as he hobbled around the kitchen, grabbing a copper pot from a hook, a ladle, put the pot on the stove, filled it piecemeal with water from a measuring cup— because he only had one hand to use now because the other had to hold a fucking crutch because of the thing in the damn kitchen with him— and then got the rabbit out of the fridge and the potatoes out of a bag on the floor next to the fridge. He salted the water and put it on heat to boil, then grabbed a wooden cutting board from beside the stove. A knife from the block. 

“You wanna help fix the potatoes?” 

God, he was stupid. He shouldn’t be giving the thing any opportunity to hold a weapon in his house. It had weapons. He was being stupid, expecting it to turn on him. Maybe if he gave it something to do, it wouldn’t hover over him, though. 

<< _Potatoes_ ,>> it repeated after him. He pulled out another cutting board and another knife. 

“The eyes. Then in quarters. Like this.” 

He showed it once, then left it to its own devices with a small pile of potatoes. He started on the rabbit.

It was already skinned, deboned, and cleaned. All he had to do was cut it into strips. 

He did that and then hobbled to the fridge again. 

Carrots and parsnips. He let one of the kids from the nearby city grab him stuff from a farmer’s market in exchange for rabbit skins and snake shed. Sometimes he got good stuff.

Other times he got carrots and parsnips. 

He grabbed a handful of each— it took two trips, because he was technically down a hand thanks to the thing currently chopping potatoes— and cut them into medallions, then tossed them into the pot.

“Put the potatoes in there when you’re done.”

It worked fast. Because it was good with a knife.

 _Duh,_ Noah thought. It was probably better with a knife than any person on the planet. 

While the vegetables softened in the pot, he grabbed a colander and a pan from their hooks. It would be a little washing, but it wasn’t as if he spent his time doing much. 

Maybe he could rope the thing into washing the dishes for him.

He laughed to himself and set the colander to the side of the sink and the pan on an open burner on the stove— put a little cooking oil into the pan, turned the heat on, and laid out the strips of rabbit. The thing watched him wash and dry the cutting boards and knives, but at a more respectful distance. When those things were done, he put the colander in the sink.

He flipped the rabbit meat and then had to work out the logistical challenge of moving the heavy copper pot over to the sink. If he was just cooking for himself, he’d use a smaller one. He wasn’t going to ask the hunter for help to save what was left of his pride.

He managed to hobble to the sink with the pot, clutching his crutch underneath his armpit and being very careful.

He drained the vegetables, then hobbled back to the stove. Overall a success!

The thing was at the computer again, scrolling through the pictures. Fine. At least it was out of the way. Noah put the rabbit meat in the pot with the vegetables to finish cooking, threw in some garlic and sage, two bay leaves and another half cup of water, and covered it. 

“It’s gonna go for twenty minutes. I’m gonna go sit on the couch.” 

It was ignoring him now.

Fine. Noah went to the living room, leaned his crutch up against the couch, sat down, and turned the television on. 

Dinner was a subdued affair. Noah served them both, ate his in silence at the kitchen counter while the hunter scrolled through the pictures for the fifth time, and then went to his bedroom to sleep.

The first two years after getting home from college, he’d stubbornly hobbled up the stairs every night and then back down every morning, like giving in and moving his bed downstairs would somehow make it more real. Like if he pretended hard enough, he would wake up and his leg would be fine, and he wouldn’t be crippled. 

He got over himself just enough to change the downstairs study into a bedroom. He went upstairs maybe four times a year, now, and since his parents had died a few years ago there was no reason to go upstairs at all.

At least the hunter wasn’t going to kill him in his sleep. Hell, maybe it would eat its dinner and leave. Maybe it wouldn’t even eat. 

He fell asleep listening to squirrels run around outside and foxes cry down in the valley. 

His morning routine did not take long. He woke up, hobbled his way to the bathroom, took a piss, brushed his teeth, showered, and hobbled back to his room to change. 

When he came out to the kitchen to grab some cereal for breakfast, the hunter was still there.

“You gotta piss?” He asked in lieu of anything else. He made himself a bowl of cereal and sat down at the counter, not bothering to look to see if it was doing anything. “You want cereal?”

It was wearing the weird helmet. It hadn’t taken it off in front of Noah, and Noah didn’t particularly want to see its face. He ate his cereal, washed the spoon and bowl and the dishes from last night-- the hunter didn’t clean up after himself, what a surprise-- put everything away, and finally took a look at the clock. 

Nine, nearly on the dot. Normally he’d read something, watch television, or answer emails, or call people. 

The hunter was still in his house and taking up a fair amount of his attention. It hadn’t destroyed the computer or stabbed anything else that Noah could see, so hopefully his house would escape with nothing more than a new notch in the countertop. 

“What is that thing?” Noah finally asked. The hunter looked up at him, then looked away again. There was a long moment of silence.

<< _Bad Blood._ >>

Noah’s hand was gripping the counter, he noticed. He eased off before he gave himself a muscle cramp or something else equally useless and embarrassing. The hunter’s voice wasn’t a mimicry this time, it seemed. It was low and growling and utterly alien, inhuman rumbling that took the shape of words. 

“Right.” He didn’t know what Bad Blood meant, but now he had a name— a title?— to attach to the creek-thing. “You gonna…?” 

Presumably, leave his house and do what it had come here to do. Then _leave_. God, he wanted it to leave. It nodded curtly and stalked to the door, opened it; then looked back at him. Noah sighed. 

“Yeah, I’ll show you where the creek is.”

The hunter was impatient with his slowness as they traversed the valley. Noah resisted pointing out that it was the hunter’s fault in the first place— it would be stupid, and rude, and he didn’t want to attract the thing’s wrath. He was slowest in the house or in stores or buildings; once they were down into the valley proper he could maneuver much more naturally, even with the crutch. The hunter moved around him more than it strictly _followed_ him; briefly pulling ahead to see whether the creek was in sight, falling behind to make sure they weren’t being stalked, going out a few yards on either side to do the same; a longer stride and two working legs made the hunter a much more far-ranging creature than Noah. 

“We’re here,” he announced. The hunter had fallen behind barely a minute ago and appeared at his shoulder before he finished speaking, so he stopped moving instead of going right up to the creek. “Good luck with the Bad Blood.”

The Bad Blood wasn’t due for another thirty minutes. It wasn’t like clockwork, but it had always managed to fall roughly within the same timeframe. If Noah was fast, he’d be out of the splash zone before the Bad Blood and the hunter got to it.

As he separated and turned to go back, the hunter suddenly snarled and launched a razor-sharp disc of metal at a tree branch only a few meters ahead. Noah was too _tired_ of this shit already to react much past a hissed _god_ , _fuck_. 

The branch hit the ground at the same time something very invisible and _heavy_ did. A plume of dust, dirt, pollen, and leaves was forced up as the thing made impact. 

They’d been followed. That’s why the hunter had been so adamant about staying at Noah’s sides for the past few minutes; the bastard knew. He was using Noah as _bait_. He’d be upset about it later; he drew his bow and nocked an arrow, pointing it at the general idea of where he believed the Bad Blood to be. 

The hunter wasn’t stupid, Noah knew but realized again. The Bad Blood definitely knew where the camera trap was, and had likely been waiting for Noah to step within view so it could get its kill caught on camera. The hunter had come up behind him and pulled his attention barely a meter away from the camera trap’s activation range.

He shot his arrow at empty space and hit dirt. The hunter howled and leapt, drawing its retractable sword and going up into the trees.

Noah saw the scuffle evolve from one massive beast to two, the larger beast causing tree branches to sag under its weight until the hunter finally dragged them both back to the ground; they set upon each other with their wristblades, though only the hunter had a sword. He shot arrows into the fray whenever he thought it may make a difference. They could barely penetrate the tough hide on the Bad Blood’s back, but after a few careful shots Noah was reminded of a bullfighting poster he’d seen in a library long ago. The poor, massive beast was charging across the arena; spears with bright red, yellow, green, and blue ribbons tied to them stuck from the bull’s back, and blood so rich and red it was almost black ran down the bull’s white hide. Noah did not know the ultimate fate of the bull, but doubted that it survived. 

The Bad Blood was larger than a bull, and perhaps far angrier. The arrows were less impressive than decorated spears. They stuck out of the Bad Blood’s back and shoulders but none had penetrated deep enough to slow it down in any meaningful way, serving only to annoy and enrage it. 

Luckily, Noah wasn’t its principal focus: that was the hunter, fighting admirably and covered in sweat and fluorescent blood, holding its own and occasionally having to retreat. The Bad Blood had both height and weight on it. In the camera, it hadn’t seemed that consequential— they were both huge compared to Noah— but in person it was rather like watching a deer trying to take down a bull moose. 

“C’mon, fucker!” Noah yelled, whether he was encouraging the hunter or cursing the Bad Blood— or perhaps cursing the hunter _and_ the Bad Blood— undecipherable. The sting of the arrows and now the sting of Noah yelling was enough to prompt the Bad Blood to roar and turn on him. Noah grit his teeth— he slung his bow back over his shoulder and held his crutch at the ready to bash the Bad Blood’s helmet in if it got any closer. 

The Bad Blood _grabbed_ the end of his crutch instead, yanking him forward— he yelped, knee collapsing underneath him, and the Bad Blood swung him until he let go. He skidded a good ten feet, flipping over himself and rolling from the force. The Bad Blood howled again and swung the crutch at a tree trunk, where it promptly made a horrific cracking noise and snapped right in half, sending the bottom half spinning away. It tossed the useless top half of the crutch into the brush and started to advance on Noah.

The thing— his thing?— his temporary ally, hadn’t killed him when he was a child, or when he was an adult but hurt and helpless. This thing was prepared to. It was _going_ to. He crossed his arms in front of his face like that might do something. He didn’t want to look at the blades. If he didn’t, maybe it wouldn’t hurt. 

The blow he expected never came. Instead, there was a terrific clang of metal and a dull fleshy thud as the hunter slammed into the Bad Blood. The Bad Blood snarled and reacted faster than Noah could see. His leg hurt enough that scintillating patterns of white popped in his vision whenever he tried to move it.

The retractable blade went spinning from the hunter’s hand. That was his chance, really, to seal his fate. Noah wouldn’t be able to run if the Bad Blood turned its attention to him again. Hell, he might not even be able to fight, but he’d give a few moments of distraction for the hunter to capitalize on. From what Noah could tell, the Bad Blood was stronger, quicker, younger and fresher in nearly every way, but it didn’t have what the hunter did—

 _experience,_ years upon years of it. It was fighting too fiercely to give an opening to be exploited. Once that happened, the Bad Blood would be as good as done for. 

Noah grabbed for the retracting blade and pulled it to himself, retracting the blade and tucking it up along his arm. It was visible, but barely. This was stupid. He was stupid. Whatever happened to him, he deserved it. He reached over his shoulder to pluck the last arrow from the quiver and waited until the Bad Blood’s back was to him; the hunter was putting up a good fight, but was overwhelmed by the sheer mass and strength of the new beast.

“Hey!”

Noah threw the arrow at it. It had been a game when he was younger— stuck on the couch, healing. He was scary good with darts. The arrow was slightly bigger, and weighted differently, and he knew from experience that the skin of these creatures was tougher than that of a dartboard, but he chose to have faith in himself rather than the opposite.

The arrow struck home and lodged into the meat of its underarm.

The Bad Blood turned, hulking mass shifting his way. It roared out indignation and pain, though it didn’t seem especially injured, more annoyed, and it charged at Noah.

Noah, who was helpless on the ground with only the retracting blade, his pocketknife, and an empty quiver. He grit his teeth and prepared to fight for his life in what would likely be the shortest and least effective fight he’d ever undertaken.

The Bad Blood was nearly on top of him before Noah saw a flash of sunlight on metal by the Bad Blood’s leg. The answering howl was loud enough to make Noah feel as it the ground were shaking, and it dropped; towards him, to run him through with its wristblades and crush him under its bulk if the former plan failed.

Noah whipped the retracting blade from under his arm and pressed the button that would extend the blade out its full length.

The Bad Blood was falling, unable to stop itself.

Noah bared his teeth and held the sword steady. 

The massive thing fell on him, driving itself down onto the sword right through its chest. The armor, even. Noah felt something in his own chest crack and then agony as what had to be at least six hundred pounds of dense muscle and angry alien collapsed onto him. 

Its wristblades embedded into the dirt right next to his left ear. Caught it, maybe, though he was too disoriented and pained to puzzle out the final destination of the wicked blades. 

“Fucker,” Noah managed through compressed lungs, and then passed out. 

He woke up naked on his porch with his clothes piled on top of him and the hunter’s retracting blade beside him. 

He hoped this meant he was done. 


	2. Sanctuary: Predator

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He recognized this Not-Prey. He’d come close to killing him, years ago, and only partially regretted it. It was strange to see the Not-Prey move so slowly and painfully when the image the Hunter kept of him was one of graceful evasion.

The years sped up as the Hunter got older, he’d learned; it barely seemed like a blink by the time he returned to Earth. He knew the area, too; he’d plagued the military base for years as little more than a ghost, and the last time he’d been there he’d nearly killed a Prey in the valley only to be interrupted by a search party. He didn’t have to stop; perhaps he shouldn’t have. It had been a rewarding Hunt, and rarely did he have to reduce a Prey so thoroughly to kill it, and perhaps he was getting sentimental in his comparative old age, so he did, and thought little of it. 

The Hunter returned in search of a Bad Blood. He’d killed children for fun; not only those who fought back but those too _young_ to fight back. He liked to see the blood leave them, he said. He liked to watch them struggle. 

He had broken the laws of the Hunt, and must be eradicated. The Hunter gladly took on the responsibility. 

It led him to a familiar hunting grounds, and he spent a day trying to track the Bad Blood with little success, finally taking refuge in a hunter’s hide. He was about to drop off to sleep when his Bio-Helm picked up a heat signature.

Prey? That wasn’t what he was here for, but might serve as bait.

Not-Prey. Unbalanced and hobbling— using a crutch to keep itself standing. Even the outline of a bow and a quiver of arrows didn’t elevate the figure outside to Prey.

The Not-Prey ducked into the hide. He groaned and favored his left leg; fiddled with a camera strapped around a tree, put something in his bag. 

He recognized this Not-Prey. He’d come close to killing him, years ago, and only partially regretted it. It was strange to see the Not-Prey move so slowly and painfully when the image the Hunter kept of him was one of graceful evasion.

“Get the fuck outta my hide.” The Not-Prey didn’t even bother to look behind himself— he knew what his hide looked like when it was disturbed. He must have seen the faint depression in the leaves where the Hunter was crouched. 

Yes, this was the Not-Prey. The Hunter could tell because he kept talking. “I don’t care what secret military tech you stole that’s got the feds after you, you shouldn’t have to be roughing it down here. C’mon up to my house when I’m done here, I’ll get you some hot food and you can sleep on the couch.”

Threats, to sympathy, to an offer to _shelter_ him. The Hunter couldn’t follow so many changes of attitude so fast. The tone remained gruff and almost angry; that, at least, was consistent. He made practiced movements in the hide— plugging in a small datastick, letting it blink slowly in the camera, picking up a tarp that hid a small toolkit and covering it once more. He crouched awkwardly to free himself from the hide and peered in once more as if he’d be able to see the Hunter if he looked hard enough.

“Last chance.” He sounded-- not exasperated, not frustrated, but tired. When he didn’t get the response he was looking for he sighed and took hold of his crutch again, tucking it under his arm and heading away from the hide. The Hunter gave him a few minutes before following. He was experienced with moving with the crutch; still slow, almost painfully slow to the Hunter, but he also knew the valley to an enviable degree. After so long different hunting grounds blended together; he’d originally intended on simply following the Not-Prey in case the Bad Blood wanted an easy prey, but if the Hunter could exploit his hospitality he might as well.

When he reached his dwelling he pushed inside, hung up his weapons, and disappeared to another room in the house.

The Hunter mimicked the motion and padded into the room. It was for food preparation. Knives, pots, a frying pan, some spoons and ladles hung up on hooks above a stove. On another table, a computer.

“Yeah,” the Not-Prey said at him, and started to turn around to greet him, “probably for the best-- _fuck_.” His hand went to his pocket-- for the pocketknife. He didn’t seem to realize that he’d done it. Then, to the counter as he decided that the Hunter didn’t mean any harm. “Fucker.”

He stared him down. It would have been more intimidating if the Hunter thought he could actually hurt him and was reminded of the way creatures would puff themselves up to look bigger. He laughed to himself a little and shook his head-- he’d always be frightening. He’d figured that the Not-Prey would be used to that by now. 

“The fuck do you want?” The Not-Prey finally said. The Hunter pointed at the computer, then at the thumbdrive with the data taken from the trail cameras. The Not-Prey sighed, shoulders lowering and eyes flickering with subdued understanding. “Yeah, sure.”

He picked up the thumbdrive and walked to the computer-- half-supporting himself on the counter. He’d left his crutch over by the other counter. Trying to hide the weakness? The Hunter already knew. There was no point. He followed, allowing the Not-Prey to get the computer set up and input the thumbdrive. A window opened; a neat grid of pictures loaded in, one by one.

“Use the mouse to go down. There’s, uh, time stamps in the lower right corner if you wanna know what time the picture was taken.” He cleared his throat. “Helps to figure out activity patterns and all.”

For the first page, the pictures were all completely normal. Animals. This was how the valley was normally, without any interlopers; isolated and unwelcoming to visitors. The Not-Prey was a part of the valley, had become as much through time, and experience, and respect for the world around him. 

On the second page was a familiar blur that the Hunter scrolled past too fast, and then had to return to. The Not-Prey leaned in, careful not to touch him but still huddling up to get a better look.

“Jesus. That’s--?” 

<> the Hunter snarled. The Not-Prey couldn’t understand him, but the Hunter knew he was smart enough to cotton on. The Not-Prey leaned in to get a better look, then retreated to a more respectful distance.

“Okay, well, keep going.” 

The Hunter wasn’t sure why the Bad Blood _hadn’t_ killed the Not-Prey yet; he was certainly an appealing target, out there all alone and capable of putting up just enough of a fight to be entertaining without being challenging. It varied geographically, of course, but everyone had guns here. The Hunter wouldn’t hunt someone alone with only a bow and arrows, especially the hobbling, lame thing that the Not-Prey was. That he’d _made_ him. Humans were so frail, and yet they were incredibly enduring creatures; _this_ one in particular.

He pulled his attention back to the screen, simmering anger at his imagined audacity of the Bad Blood and the severity of his crimes prickling at his sensibilities. 

Worst of all, he wasn’t even doing it for attention-- that was not perhaps forgivable, but understandable. He was butchering helpless things for _entertainment_. The Hunter would bring him to justice, and it would be justice, not a split-second moment of anger, because he was better than that. He was angry enough now to clench his hand around his retracting blade and embed it in the countertop, the scarred helm and lopped dreadlocks of the Bad-Blood forefront in his mind.

The Not-Prey hissed at him, surprised and-- upset. At him. 

“Not--” he twitched, caught between fear and irritation, “not in the fucking _house_ \--” Definitely irritation, and the Not-Prey moved towards him instead of away like he knew the action wasn’t directed at him. “Outside, now. If you wanna stab shit, you’re gonna stab shit outside.” 

He’d ducked under the blade and was tugging at the Hunter’s armor insistently. The Hunter growled, but retrieved his blade and tucked it away. 

“That’s what I thought,” the Not-Prey growled back, brows knitted. Tension drained out of him once the weapon was out of sight. Humans were foolish like that; they knew well enough that a weapon could be bared within the second, but the simple action of putting a weapon down soothed them. The Not-Prey leaned against the counter and looked around the Hunter, the sides of his mouth twitching into a slight frown. He was favoring his bad leg, leaning heavily on the counter and letting it bend slightly, keeping pressure off of it. “Can you--?”

 _Demanding little Prey_ , the Hunter thought, not for the first time, and strangely wasn’t bothered by the request. He reached for the indicated crutch and passed it to the Not-Prey. 

“Thanks,” the Not-Prey muttered, and set it to rights under his arm. “Why are you here again?”

Maybe it was a dig at him putting his sword in the counter, but more likely it was an honest question trying to get them both back on track. The Hunter pointed at the screen, growled, and made his wristblades extend with a metallic _click_. The Not-Prey shrugged, indicating that he understood and also that he did not care. “Okay. Well, it’s out and about down there around noon. You can go and check right now or stick around for dinner.” He paused, looking the Hunter up and down and finally settling on the wristblades. “Put those things away.”

 _Demanding_. Not unafraid, the Not-Prey wasn’t stupid, but he’d gotten the Hunter to obey him once and now thought that he had some leverage. He didn’t, but there was no need to keep his wristblades out, so the Hunter retracted them. He cocked his head and pulled up the Not-Prey’s most recent vocalization. << **Dinner.** >>

The Not-Prey shrugged again. “Yeah, dinner.”

The Not-Prey kept talking as he moved around the kitchen, grabbing a pot and some utensils. It was something he knew how to do very well, with how practiced and easy his movements were. The Hunter only partly tuned him out, listening distantly to his tone and easy cadence while letting the content of his speech fall by the wayside.

“You wanna help fix the potatoes?” The Not-Prey seemed to immediately regret the words as soon as he said them, wincing and jerking his head to the side. His hand tightened around the knife. 

<< **Potatoes,** >> the Hunter echoed. The Not-Prey sighed. He was easy to frighten, and just as easily put at ease—coming close yet again to show him how to prepare the vegetables. The Hunter was soon left with a small pile of potatoes and a kitchen knife. He should be at the computer again, or even down in the valley trying to track down the Bad Blood, but he had a lead-- knew where the Bad Blood would be tomorrow. He didn’t allow himself to feel guilty for remaining at the counter cutting potatoes into quarters.

“Put the potatoes in there when you’re done,” the Not-Prey said to him, indicating the copper pot, and continued to move through the kitchen with experienced purpose. He was obviously thinking about something, making little noises to himself, some worried and some decidedly neutral, and even something that sounded like a laugh. Amusement. The Hunter found himself wondering what the Not-Prey could be thinking about, and just as abruptly forced himself to think about the potential whereabouts of the Bad Blood instead.

He put the potatoes in the pot and went to the computer again.

“It’s gonna go for twenty minutes. I’m gonna go sit on the couch.”

The Hunter ignored him. A minute later, the television turned on, flooding the kitchen with subdued, meaningless white noise.

The Not-Prey put a bowl of the meal next to him a little while later and ate his own food at the counter, put his bowl in the sink, and disappeared down the hall-- the Hunter waited a few minutes before removing his helm and eating his own dinner. It was surprisingly good. _I did that_ , he thought, as he held a nearly quartered potato on his spoon. He allowed himself to reflect on the strangeness of the whole situation until he was finished with his dinner.

The Hunter was surprised that the Not-Prey hadn’t given him a name yet. That was the first things humans did when they wanted to control something, give it a name, and make it seem less foreign and threatening. He had a name, of course, given to him by his clan, but he was skilled enough to shed it in times like these for the plain address of _Hunter_. He’d never been given a name that he knew of by any humans. Maybe that was a testament to his skill; none who saw were left to tell, and he was efficient enough with his hunts that the evidence was unusable. Even his hunts at the military base led to him being tagged as little more than a target.

He didn’t have a name for the Not-Prey either; perhaps, though, because the Not-Prey didn’t want to control him, he just wanted him to leave. He’d offered his aid, and his food, and his home, and had given all of them, but he wanted the Hunter to leave. 

He sighed and leaned back in the couch. 

The air was cloying and humid even late at night, and soon enough the Hunter dozed off.

He woke up to an alarm. The Not-Prey’s-- from his room. The Hunter took care of himself and was back in the house before the Not-Prey emerged from the back of the house. He grabbed a bowl, then a box of cereal, then some milk from the fridge, then came and sat down. 

“You gotta piss?”

The Hunter didn’t respond. 

“You want cereal?”

He didn’t respond to that either, just returned to the computer. The Not-Prey finished his cereal and proceeded to move around the kitchen with purpose, washing up the dishes from last night, and finally came to stand at the Hunter’s elbow. There was a long, heavy moment of silence as the Not-Prey looked at the screen.

“What is that thing?” His voice was quiet. He _was_ afraid, the Hunter realized. He’d been afraid the entire time, but he knew better than to show it, too used to defending himself from creatures that would tear him apart at the slightest indication of fear. The Hunter noticed that he was staring and looked at the computer.

<>

The Not-Prey was tense. Gripping the counter. _Fear_ again _._ It was gone within the second. “Right. You gonna…?” Curious, but expectant. If he could, the Hunter figured the Not-Prey would be shoving him out of his house. He walked to the door, himself rather excited to finally get the hunt underway properly; but he didn’t know where the creek was, and would waste time looking for it. He looked back at the Not-Prey, who to his credit picked up on what the Hunter was wordlessly asking immediately. The Not-Prey sighed, resigned.

“Yeah, I’ll show you where the creek is.”

The Not-Prey retrieved his arrow and quiver from their hooks by the door and led the way. The Hunter followed along dutifully for a few minutes, but rapidly got tired and restless of the snail’s pace. He could cover _more_ ground, _faster,_ but there was quite a lot of ground to cover in the valley and for once precision was necessary.

It had only been another ten minutes until the Hunter started feeling _watched_. Without being obvious about it, he hung back, as if he were hunting the Not-Prey-- waiting for him to take himself deeply enough in the valley that any noises would not be suspect.

They were definitely being followed. The Not-Prey was unawares, which was really for the best; the Hunter had no doubts he’d blow it somehow. He’d run. Maybe once it would have worked, because the Not-Prey had been _good_ at running, but not now. 

He advanced on the Not-Prey once the creek was in view. He was being followed close behind, barely a few meters distance between him and something else that was moving through the trees. The camera trap was only a meter away, and somehow the Hunter knew that the Not-Prey would not survive if he went in the camera’s detection range. The Bad Blood would attack-- and the Hunter wanted the first move.

“We’re here,” the Not-Prey announced. “Good luck with the Bad Blood.”

Quietly, but the ploy was up regardless. The Hunter turned as the Not-Prey split off to find his way home, and tossed throwing disc at the sagging branch that he knew the Bad Blood was perched on. He heard a quiet _god, fuck_ , hissed behind him, and ignored it to advance on the invisible, heavy figure that had impacted with the ground. There was a _thwip_ of air behind him, the slap of a bowstring on a leather guard, and an arrow embedded itself into the dirt at the Bad Blood’s feet.

The Bad Blood leapt back into the trees, his cloak falling off of him in ripples like a heat-haze. The Hunter followed, screaming. The Bad Blood was huge even for a Yautja, scarred up all over, and even though he’d had lost most of his weaponry after being labeled a _Bad Blood_ he still had his wristblades and brute strength, and an animalistic, frenzied speed that the Hunter had a hard time following. He’d done quite well for himself slaughtering helpless creatures; his clear lack of experience and technique would shame him in proper Yautja society. He was still large, and strong, and fast, and with the fervor of youth that the Hunter had long since replaced with tempered determination. The Hunter finally struck him properly on the chest and brought them both to the ground— blood covered him up to the elbow, but it was a theatrical spray and not a severe injury. The ground under them exploded in a shower of leaf litter and dirt again, and the Bad Blood’s breath was knocked out for a moment that allowed the Hunter to slice into his chest again before the Bad Blood surged up, jumping to his feet and renewing the melee. The Not-Prey had a good aim; as soon as he’d gotten them to the ground, the Hunter moved around the Bad Blood in a way that bared his back for arrows. They couldn’t lodge in deeply enough to severely injure the Bad Blood, but pain was a distraction.

As well as he was doing, a sinking feeling was beginning to seize the Hunter around the chest. He was being beaten back. He was cut up from the wristblades, and while the Bad Blood was bleeding in equal measure, he had far more blood to give. Maybe he could cripple it and blow them all up; it would still be honorable. He would prefer to walk away victorious.

He’d do what he had to do. His shoulders were burning from lacerated skin and the Bad Blood had even tried to cut the muscle in his thigh— had missed, but it was a deep injury regardless.

“C’mon, fucker!” 

That was the Not-Prey, again, and an arrow thudded neatly into the meat of the Bad Blood’s shoulder. The Hunter backed up to catch his breath while the Not-Prey held the Bad Blood’s attention for a moment. The Not-Prey slung his bow over his shoulder and brandished his crutch as if it would help. The Hunter knew it wouldn’t. 

It must be agonizing. The Bad Blood seized the crutch and yanked the Not-Prey forward like a fish on a lure-- the Hunter, through a haze of blood, saw the Not-Prey’s bad leg buckle-- and then swung him violently to the side, sending him skidding off through the underbrush. He came to a stop, and did not move. 

The Bad Blood shattered the crutch in half against a tree and tossed the bottom half away, snarling, bloodied wristblades bared to take care of the Not-Prey. He’d been neutralized-- there was no point, unless the Bad Blood wanted a trophy, or else revenge, or simply for the fun of it. 

The Hunter’s heart skipped a beat as the Not-Prey did move, finally, though only to cross his arms in front of his face. He was shaking. 

The Hunter had caught his breath and steeled himself. He leapt forward once again, colliding with the Bad Blood, the sensation of flesh and armor clashing warring with the thunderous _sound_ of it. The Not-Prey moaned lowly, brokenly, in pain, easily enough ignored as the Hunter focused on tearing the Bad Blood’s flesh to ribbons. The Bad Blood hit him, right along the hip, slicing him from front to back. Not a good hit, just a messy one. As the Hunter slashed his chest open, the Bad Blood got in a good hit of his own-- right along his arm, forcing the retracting blade to spin out of his hand. 

He still pulled them away from the Not-Prey, a last, frantic attempt to down the Bad Blood before blood loss got the better of him or they trampled the Not-Prey. The Bad Blood was slowing down, too, but not as quickly as the Hunter.

“Hey!” The Not-Prey yelled, but the Hunter knew better than to think the distraction was for him— for his sake, yes. The Bad Blood howled again-- something _must_ have happened, and he caught a glimpse of one of the hunter’s long composite arrows lodged into the meat of the Bad Blood’s underarm. It wasn’t a lucky shot, but one thrown with some degree of precision and desperate force. It would have hit tougher skin or armor otherwise. 

It was an opening. The Hunter caught his breath in the same instant that the Bad Blood disengaged from him to target the Not-Prey instead. 

He’d die, the Hunter knew. The Hunter saw the glint of his retracting blade pinned between the Not-Prey’s arm and body and realized that the Not-Prey knew, as well. The Hunter made his decision in the split-second he had to make it— he hurled his throwing disc at the Bad Blood’s calf. Another howling noise, surprised pain, and the Hunter watched as he tried to pull back and arrest his movement. 

He failed. His wristblades thrust into the earth mere millimeters from the Not-Prey’s head, and the blade of the Hunter’s retracting knife stuck from its back like a spire. From the instant loss of movement the Hunter knew he’d been pierced through the heart. 

The Not-Prey wheezed some heartfelt variation of _fuck_ , then passed out. 

The Hunter moved quickly to haul the dead, heavy body up and toss it to the side. He went back to the Not-Prey and examined his state— making it twice now that he’d saved his life, though in wildly different contexts each time. The Not-Prey was breathing, but slowly, shallowly. His ribcage was cracked from the impact of the sword hilt, though thankfully not caved in. 

The Hunter stripped him and smeared medigel on his chest, then took care of his own injuries, then got to work destroying the Bad Blood.

The Not-Prey woke up around the tail end of it and watched him blearily. On the Hunter, the medigel would make him a bit drowsy but nothing more; the Not-Prey was basically tranquilized. Still, he struggled to his feet, looking around for something— the crutch— and, unable to find it, looked up to find his bearings and started to stagger off still naked. 

The Hunter grumbled to himself and finished up his work. The Not-Prey wasn’t going very far very fast, and wasn’t capable of being stealthy about it in his state.

Once he was done he tracked the Not-Prey down about a quarter of a mile away and picked him up. The Not-Prey made a betrayed, agitated sound and squirmed a little bit; then, calmed down, and fell back to sleep a few minutes later. The Hunter finished the trek up to his house and set him down on the porch. He left the retracting blade next to him, and set off. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> got talked into writing a THIRD PART for this series so look out for THAT.  
> I love kudos, I love comments, they keep me writing! Feel free to tell me what you thought!

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to tell me what you thought! Kudos and comments make my day!


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